Mod Monetisation in Mundus: Steam Workshop Facilitates Paid Skyrim Mods

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, Bethesda Game Studios, Bethesda Softworks, 2011

The modding community of Skyrim wastes no time. Not even a week went by from when Steam announced they would support non-Valve games having paid mods, starting with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, before they decided to take the feature down. An announcement made on Steam highlights that they realised from customer feedback that it was a bad idea to introduce the model into the already-established Skyrim mod community. It turns out that although Steam has had success with introducing paid mods in their own gaming communities, Skyrim’s community was a whole new kettle of fish.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks -Featuring Immersive Armors by Hothtrooper44, Caliente’s Beautiful Bodies Eddition (CBBE) Body Replace by Caliente (NSFW), and Poupouri ENBs (First Seed) Extended by MACHIIMACHII
Look, Simba. Everywhere the light touches, that’s a mod. Even my face—mods (The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks featuring Immersive Armors by Hothtrooper44, Caliente’s Beautiful Bodies Eddition (CBBE) Body Replace by Caliente (NSFW), and Poupouri ENBs (First Seed) Extended by MACHIIMACHII).

The basics of this feature were relatively simple: mod authors can upload their mods to the Steam Workshop with a monetary value of their choosing. Users can then purchase these mods. The revenue is split: 25% to the mod author and the rest split between Valve and the game owner (in this case, Bethesda). They operate a 24-hour refund policy as well, so if you download a mod you don’t end up liking, you can uninstall it and get a refund.

To the practical-minded, the uninvolved, and those from modding communities that already have this feature (such as Team Fortress 2)  that sounds fair enough. And while some mod users will lament at having to pay for mods, there are many that understand the work that goes into that and wouldn’t mind compensating for it. But the system hasn’t been thought out and it flies in the face of the community’s atmosphere as a whole.

Unfortunately, the Skyrim mod community is rife with theft, people stealing the mod of others and redistributing them for free for reputation and bragging rights alone. This new system gave them an avenue not just to distribute stolen mods, but to profit off of them. The Workshop had also seen a flood of mediocre mods trying to cash in on a quick change. For example, there was a mod that adds 25,000 gold for the low, low price of £0.33. That doesn’t sound like much – unless you consider that all you need to do that is a simple console command in-game, for free. (It’s “player.additem f 25000”, by the way. That’ll be £1, please.)

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks Featuring Ponytail Hairstyles by Azar DCE - Realistic Male Face (Dark Elf Smooth) by Drumber and Poupouri ENBs (First Seed) Extended by MACHIIMACHII
So, how much do you think I could get for this mod, which changes only ONE man in the game, Revyn Sadri, to look less fugly? I’m thinking £10. Yeah, that sounds good (The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks featuring Ponytail Hairstyles by Azar, DCE – Realistic Male Face (Dark Elf Smooth) by Drumber and Poupouri ENBs (First Seed) Extended by MACHIIMACHII).

Oddly enough, I couldn’t find an FAQ or guide on what this “review” process was. For starters, it seemed to conflict with Bethesda’s own requirement that the Workshop be uncurated. This was because they didn’t want the communicate stifled or censored – which is noble, but a little naive. The number of mods “Under Review” far outnumbered those released, so how did those mods get put under review? My only guess is that if a mod was flagged as “unsuitable” or in violation, it was then put under review. But as I said, I couldn’t actually find anything on it.

Moving on to the more touchy-feely side of things, the concept just felt wrong at this point. There is a general understanding and feel to the community, that mod authors were doing this as a hobby and we appreciated their time and effort and their willingness to share their creations with us. Introducing pay options to mods turns it from a loving hobby into cold business. “I will make this mod because it makes me money.” “I will make these changes that I don’t necessarily agree with because ‘customers’ have a demand for it.” “If I am a good person, I must support my mod through thick and thin because people are paying for it.” A lot of mod authors have seen strain when interest in their mods has arisen and struggled with the feedback of suggested changes, support requests, and general self-entitlement some users feel – and that’s when it was free.

This one just may be me, it also feels in direct conflict to the big rule Bethesda and the community itself has been drilling into its head since the days of Morrowind – you don’t make money from mods. It has always been a part of the EULA for Bethsoft’s games that you cannot make money off of content created with their Creation Kit. While you may make your own 3D models, customised textures, or insert new audio to the game, the mod files themselves (the .esp and .esm files) cannot be sold. Some people fought against this grain by hiding their mods behind paywalls, such as hosting them on sites that required paid memberships or “mandatory” donations. Any time someone tried to make users pay, Bethesda tended not to waste time in smacking their hands. The concept of donations became popular, which Nexus Mods (the leading site for uploading and downloading mod creations) has facilitated. I wouldn’t be surprised if some were using Patreon as a platform as well. We all embraced it – mod authors and users. So to suddenly have this notion turned on its head, to be told you could outright sell and buy mods and it was okay – it’s not something that settled in well. My instincts, the ones Bethesda instilled in me, just keeps telling me that it’s wrong, even though they are the ones now saying it’s right. (This is starting to sound like a bad porn…)

The backlash was immediate and massive. The community was up in arms and divided. Some agreed with the monetisation and some vehemently opposed it. Another divide was against the mod authors themselves – those who support the mod authors who decided to partake in the system and those who lambasted them as sell-outs. It became so toxic that one mod authors whom was invited to pilot the system, Chesko, has begun retreating from the mod community altogether after his experience with both Valve and with users. I can’t say I’m surprised that the community has gone into uproar, even to a horrid degree. It is an internet community, after all, and is not immune to the anonymous-mob perils that come with it.

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks
There should be enough material from this fiasco to make three M’aiq the Liars in the next game (The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim by Bethesda Softworks featuring Poupouri ENBs (First Seed) Extended by MACHIIMACHII).

Ultimately, I just don’t know. I feel like I’m too close to it, being an avid user of mods since Oblivion as well as dabbling in making a few of my own. I can understand the positive intent they were trying to make – allowing mod authors to be properly compensated for their efforts, paving the way for larger and more elaborate mods to be created now that there was real hard incentive to work on them, creating a platform for mod authors to apply their skills professionally. Still, it just didn’t feel right, like some of the soul of it has been tarnished by throwing a fresh of capitalist paint on it.

As a final thought, I’m curious if this model would have been more successfully introduced on a new game from the start, such as maybe the next Fallout game. Sure, there would be some backlash there as well, but if the precedent is set from the beginning, it may not feel as such a foreign (or offensive) concept. It would also give them time to think things through better, maybe take a look at the existing Workshop communities and even examine other parties (such as the Unreal Marketplace) to see how things are going there. It’s just clear that their first approach was ill-timed and naively done.

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Cathryn Sinjin-Starr

Cathryn Sinjin-Starr

An American specimen (subspecies: Michigander), now under research in the United Kingdom. Subject appears to sustain itself on video games and webcomics. Favourite flavours are fantasy and sci-fi, with a slice of life on the side. Hair has an odd chameleon property - it continually shifts in colour according to mood and, as previous researcher described, “zaniness”.

8 thoughts on “Mod Monetisation in Mundus: Steam Workshop Facilitates Paid Skyrim Mods

  1. Also: a point brought up in some of this discussion, how responsible does this make the mod creators down the road. Like when the game updates and the mods you paid for no longer work, do they now have a responsibility to go back and update their mods? So much unanswered.

    1. That did come up a little bit. I think the consensus was that that was one of the risks – the mod author had no obligation to update their mod if that happened. I doubt there will be many, if any, official updates to worry about, but things like the Unofficial Patches are still being updated and a lot of mods will conflict with those changes if they’re not careful.

      My guess is that they would assume that mod authors would feel morally obligated to do updates, or the ones that begin doing modding for serious money would look at it as just part of the business process.

  2. I like the idea of games that embrace the idea of modding and don’t mind if they ‘take advantage’ of that in some way that works to the advantage of the player and modder as well. I didn’t play it much, but I liked the concept behind Neverwinter’s player made dungeons. Developers know people are going to do this and leave the opportunity there for them in some cases, so it would behoove the developers to work more openly with modders, I should think, and offer the resources openly, even if there’s a charge for the use and delivery. I think it would be neat to have a system where modders and the developer could profit off of the mods (assuming the prices were reasonable), as long as my characters can be pretty… so important….

    Either way, definitely not appropriate to introduce it into a 3 year old game.

    1. I agree. Especially on the pretty character front. The amount of mods I had on Oblivion to make things prettier is overwhelming. And I wouldn’t mind dropping a little bit of cash for that, but not when I’ve already enjoyed those benefits for years.

      1. I recently had to learn how to merge mods in TES5Edit becaue I hit the 255-limit. Whoops. Luckily, I was able to merge most of the clothing/armour mods together to bring that number down by about 20. I was able to do the same for most of my hair mods, so that was another 10-15 together. It escalates quickly!

        While I do appreciate modders for their work, trying tot think of how much my mod setup is “worth” is a bit dizzying! If I paid £1 for each mod – £255! £0.50 x 250 = £125! Oof!

  3. “As a final thought, I’m curious if this model would have been more successfully introduced on a new game from the start”

    I really think so! I think some modders would have embraced this as a different realm of modding. But, maybe I’m just overly optimistic.

    1. I think it would have worked on a new game, where it was presented from the start. One, it felt weird introducing it in a community that was already 3 years running. Two, it’s a big example of “paying for something that was once free” – no one ever thinks of that type of situation positively. To play a mod for 2-3 years for free and then suddenly get hit with a cost for the next update wasn’t going to settle well with anyone.

      I hope they don’t entirely give up on the idea, but I hope they bought a lot more thought into any future attempts to let mod authors earn some money from their work. But if they keep their stance on being uncurated, I don’t know how well it will ever do.

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